I quit playing FFXI because of a few problems:
1. Not being able to play in windowed mode or to alt-tab out
This is kind of a passive issue that is really more of a problem than I initially thought it was. When I first started playing, I was ok with this because I had a whole new world to explore. Later, it became a hinderance due to the amount of time it takes to get ANYTHING in this game accomplished, and having to isolate myself in the game world. I didn't like having to take the time to log out and restart the program when I wanted to check something on the web, so I just always stayed in the game for the most part. This is what really influenced the game to have more "control" over me and really begin to interfere with real life.
2. Extremely limited amount of mobs to fight
The lack of enemies to fight is really sad. In any other Final Fantasy game, you'll run in to all kinds of enemies in the same area. While I realize most, if not all, MMORPG's are similar in this manner, it just gets boring staring at the same enemies that are EVERYWHERE. This could also be just due to the lack of memory available in the PS2. Maybe the next online Final Fantasy on a next generation platform will allow for more model/gemoetry variety, which will translate better over to the PC.
3. Mobs being the exact same color (mostly) and just getting larger
In relation to #2, this is also a problem. Having the same enemies all over wouldn't be nearly as big of an issue if they at least varied in colors. It seriously would not be hard at all for them to add different skins to enemies, or even just have one universal skin where the color is randomly applied. Lots of MMORPG's do this, but not FFXI. Sure, a few enemies have this feature like mandragoras, lizards, and even crabs (very subtly, grey, red, and blue), but going to an exp area and seeing all the mobs you're about to fight with the exact same appearance is boring.
4. Needed specific party configurations to be able to exp successfully
While Japanese players will sometimes take what they can get and form nice parties that actually work, it would be really nice to be able to go party in groups of three or four and gain a useful amount of experience over time. Other games allow for this. The experience penalty for the obscure monster ratings (ep, em, etc) force you to form complete and at least somewhat coherent parties. You can never just form a quick party with just a couple friends and go get things, other than very easy quests, done.
5. Lack of useful items earned from questing
The items you get from quests in the game are completely useless. There's a quest in Jeuno where you can get a pair of level 45 gloves that are rare/ex that have +1 vit and +1 int. Some may argue that they are useful, but when do you need int alongside vit? There are lower level gloves that give you better stats for any job. There is a lot of footwork and patience involved in the quest, too, and this isn't the only quest like this. Why not create quests that give equipment at least somewhat comparable to items that are in the game now? Having several quests that give job specific items that span many levels would be fun. You'd get to level your job, then take that job to go do a quest to get some equipment that is actually useful and having to use your job's skills to accomplish this. It could work how while engaged in event mobs, no outside party can heal you, etc, so just make the quest where you can't be effected by other people and cannot join a party while doing this quest. It would give a lot more depth and free you from forever grinding, and give you a chance to actually use your character for something useful that isn't high level. Being on a high level is fun and all, but what happens to the rest of the game in between level 1 and 75? The first time through the game, it may be different, as you'd be doing missions for your airship pass and such, but during your second job and so on, this isn't the case, it's all about hitting 37 or 75.
6. Amount of grinding it takes to level beyond ~65
I don't really know how they could change this, but if there were maybe series of quests you had to do to gain levels or experience, that would be nice. Like having to form a party and go complete several objectives to get 5k experience, but only if the objective has been completed, and then have the chance of items dropping that can only be found from those quest objectives so that people that have already completed them will actually be willing to help. The items would have to be useful though, as mentioned earlier, and not something stupid like defense and +1 vit on a weapon. The item stats would really need to be something special that would make it worthwhile to go through the quests several times just for a chance to get one.
6b - Exp camps
There are some places in the game that are just made for camping to get exp, and people take advantage of these place, while there are other areas that are much more dangerous, and while it is possible to exp there, you run high risk of getting aggro from a pop in the middle of a fight (first place that comes to mind is fighting processionaires in the tunnels, not the water). There should be more clearly defined places made for camping enemies. I don't mind fighting in more dangerous spots where you can get aggro, but there needs to be a set amount of mobs where you can constantly pull and not have to fight with another group over a silly five mobs that appear only every 10 minutes. OR, if possible, changing the way mobs check to you would make people more willing to camp newer areas to fight new kinds of enemies. At 75 it doesn't matter what they con, because someone has to kill it, and being the highest level means you can, but goign to an area where everything it IT++ isn't very helpful in letting you know if your group even stands a chance of killing it.
7. Multi-national Servers
I like Japanese players as much as the next person, but the lack of auto-translate sayings and the inability to type in Japanese is a real turn off. I can read katakana and hiragana, and would love to be able to type this to Japanese players. They can type roman letters, so why can't we type Japanese letters? It's also annoying when I can read that a Japanese person is shouting to start a party for certain levels and looking for a certain job, and I have that job and level, but they won't let me join and don't even respond to my tells saying I meet what they are looking for, or when they're shouting for help to do quests or BCNM and will not ever return the tell, even when I tell them in Japanese or with the translator. They'll gladly take your help if it's for some rare/ex item for them, though, like artifact armor. I think if the servers were per-nation, like US only servers, it would be easier to get parties and find people that won't tell you "JP ONLY", etc. It gets old having a party of five and then no Japanese players willing to join and they're all that is left. You would at least then know that you can't create a full party beforehand. Having more local servers would also reduce the lag. While the lag isn't too big of a deal, it's annoying hitting provoke macro or throught he menu and not having the animation go off until a second later. That's just poor planning, and it is also why the window to perform a skillchain is so large.
Anyhow, that is a short list of what I think needs to be changed in FFXI the way it is right now. For the future, they're really going to need to add more missions that do not have low level caps and they're going to HAVE to add more jobs eventually. If not, the game will die much sooner than later -- but that is from an American's standpoint, I don't know how attached Japanese players become with their MMORPG characters, so it could end up going JP ONLY throughout the entire game in the end.
World of Warcraft actually addresses several of these problems and does so very well, and keeps the game fun. With that said, however, I do not player World of Warcraft (play my free 30 day trial and that was all), but I did play the beta for quite a while and it was enjoyable. AND WITH THAT SAID, I think FFXI's combat system is a lot more fun that WOW's... if only they could somehow merge.
